Disclaimer: I do not own Harry Potter. Thank goodness J.K. Rowling exists.
Chapter Twenty
"Cedric," Cho murmured, her voice soft. He turned to look into her anxious almond-shaped brown eyes. "Did you hear what I just said?"
Cedric had been looking at the Gryffindor table again, his eyes greeted by Granger's empty chair. He was innocently curious about where she was because he had just seen her a few hours earlier on her way to one of her classes. Neville Longbottom had been talking animatedly with her and she was nodding along but Cedric noticed that her mind seemed far away.
He shook his head. She was probably studying or something like that. "Sorry, Cho," he said, smiling slightly embarrassedly at her. "Do you mind repeating that for me?"
She smiled, relieved, and recounted how her day went once more.
Cedric felt conflicted, his mind drifting again. He cared for Cho very much, but there was something about the Granger girl that kept capturing his attention. She wasn't extraordinarily beautiful, but she had a simple prettiness in the light freckles that dotted her cheeks and the rebellious mousy-colored ringlets that fell in her face. She had ordinary brown eyes, but he noticed that when they captured the light, they looked almost like amber.
His fixation on her was undoubtedly strange, but he couldn't help the inexplicable attraction he felt toward her. He racked his brain for any instances where he had found her appealing before he died—which was still a bizarre thing to consider itself—but he always came up with nothing. There was just something magnetic about her that drew him to her.
It was an innocuous thing that occupied his mind more often than not. He didn't exactly fancy her, but there was something in the way that she would blow the fringe out of her eyes and gingerly handle each page of the large books she carried around that made him want to learn more about her despite that he felt like he genuinely understood her when they'd only talked a handful of times.
And then there were his dreams. Last night's was one of the oddest ones he'd had in a while. It had been composed of bits and pieces that seemed disjointed and unconnected, but there was a part of him aching to put it all together. She had been in it, of course, but only in fragmented flashes.
She looked normal first, and suddenly it blurred together and her hair was platinum blonde and piled into a complicated updo, her brown eyes changed to striking blue-grey framed by long, dark lashes, and her smiling lips were painted a deep, sensual shade of red. He had barely gotten the chance to get a good look at the tight-fitting dress that clung to her small waist before everything swirled together again.
There she was again, her face smeared with what looked like ash and tendrils of blonde hair falling loose from the elegant twist, falling forward to the ground but catching herself on her hands. Cedric remembered rushing forward to her when he noticed her distress, his heart plummeting to the ground when he saw the tears swimming in her eyes. He had wanted to wrap her up in his arms to protect her from whatever had hurt her, and just when he was about to say something, everything went black again and, much to his frustration, he woke up in his dormitory.
He noticed movement to his left and saw Scott moving to leave the bench. "Where are you going now?"
Scott's brows were drawn together with worry. "I'm going to see if I can find Hermione because," he glanced over at the Gryffindor table where Ron Weasley and Harry Potter seemed perfectly content in their own conversations, "they seem preoccupied with their girlfriends at the moment."
Cedric didn't know why he did it, but he suddenly stood up. "I'll help you," he offered. He briefly looked at Cho and found her staring at him in surprise before looking back at Scott. "I never properly thanked her for what she did for me, at any rate."
Naomi, Andrew, and Aiden followed suit. "We want to help, too," Naomi said, pushing some of her dark hair behind her ear.
Scott smiled, shaking his head in disbelief. "Thanks, guys, but I think Ced and I can take care of this." Naomi opened her mouth to argue but he cut her off by adding, "We don't want to overwhelm the poor girl."
Andrew put his arm around his girlfriend's shoulders and pressed a kiss to her forehead. She wrinkled her nose playfully at him as he said, his blue eyes shining, "You two go ahead, then. I think I can handle her."
Aiden looked between them and sighed, rolling his brown eyes at the couple's public display of affection. "I guess I'll third wheel these losers again." He muttered, but the group knew that their tan friend meant it fondly.
Once they had settled back into their seats, they bid the other two boys goodbye before they made their way to the library. "She goes here a lot," Scott informed Cedric, who nodded.
"Makes sense." He said as they walked inside. He glanced around for a moment before asking, "Where would she be in here?"
Scott pointed in the direction of a few visible bookshelves in the labyrinthine library. "Over there. She has a special place she always goes just through here," he said, guiding Cedric toward Hermione's alcove. They were both surprised to find it empty, even after Scott scanned the area for any chairs that had been transfigured into bean bags. "She always does that," he told Cedric with a shrug.
"Well," Cedric said after a moment, walking among a few rows of shelves before poking his head around to look at his friend, "I don't think she's here." Scott shook his head in agreement. "Should we check the Gryffindor commons?"
Scott shrugged his shoulders again. "Sounds like a reasonable idea to me," he answered, leading the way back toward the entrance.
They walked along the corridors in silence until they came to the painting of the Fat Lady that hung over the hole that led to the Gryffindor common room. She squinted her oil-painted eyes at them inquisitively before recognizing Scott.
Her expression softened fractionally, her cheeks blushing slightly as she said, "Looking for the Granger girl in broad daylight, are you?" She shook her head with a smirk, clicking her tongue. "I never knew Hufflepuffs were so daring and..." she looked Scott up and down while he stood in front of the portrait with a horrified look on his face as her innuendo set in, "romantic."
Scott stuttered incredulously few times before finally managing to stammer, "What the bloody hell are you going off about, you insane bint?"
Cedric covered his mouth to hide his smile, chuckling quietly. Scott slanted his eyes over to his friend with a deathly stare of annoyance and Cedric did his best to compose himself. When Scott looked away again, Cedric couldn't fight the smile that caused the corners of his lips to twitch anymore.
The painting raised an unimpressed brow. "I also assumed that Hufflepuffs were supposed to be friendly and honest, but I see that I was clearly mistaken."
Scott narrowed his eyes at her and pointed a finger up toward her. "Listen here, you old bat. All I came here to do was ask you a question. Do you think you can handle that?"
She lifted her nose in the air in an insulted manner. "That depends on whether or not you're capable of at least attempting to be civil, you insufferable child."
Cedric pushed Scott aside when he let out an indignant snort, putting on his most charismatic smile. The painting's eyes widened as she shifted her attention to the other boy. "I apologize for my friend Scott. He can be a little difficult to deal with sometimes, but he means well," Cedric said apologetically.
"Oh," she replied, her posture relaxing, "that's quite alright." She glanced tastelessly over at Scott before looking at Cedric again. "I deal with aggravating students all the time."
Scott narrowed his eyes at her and crossed his arms, forcibly keeping himself quiet so Cedric could charm the answer they wanted out of her. "Have you seen Hermione Granger today?"
The Fat Lady shook her head. "Not since this morning, no. Why do you ask?"
Cedric and Scott exchanged a weary look before Cedric said, "We wanted to talk to her about something. Thank you for your help."
She blushed and batted her eyelashes at him. "You're quite welcome."
The boys left her to her daydreaming and began their search again. They looked in a few empty classrooms before Scott suggested that they check the Room of Requirement. Cedric gave him a skeptical look. "You've been there before?"
Scott shrugged noncommittally. "Yeah, so?"
Cedric blinked in surprise. "Nothing, mate." He said. "I just thought I was the only one who'd ever been there." They were walking down the corridor that Cedric recognized as he told him, "I used to go there when I was in the Tournament. The stress would grate my nerves until I couldn't take it anymore, so I'd—" he stopped for a minute, the strangest feeling of déjà vu coming over him as he said that. Those words felt so familiar to him, as if he'd said them before, but he didn't know how that was possible when he'd never talked about it with anyone before.
They stopped in front of the wall where the door would appear and Scott gave him a look. "You okay?"
Cedric nodding, exhaling. It was just some freak thing, that's all. "Yeah."
Even as he thought that, for some reason his mind drifted to an image of Hermione's curious face sitting on one of the brown couches from his dream, firelight reflecting off of her face.
"The door isn't materializing." Scott said, and the boys mirrored each other's puzzled expressions.
"Someone's probably already in there," Cedric told him.
Scott's brows drew together, nonplussed. "D'you think it's her?"
"Granger?" Cedric asked. Scott nodded. "No."
They stood there in silence for a moment before Scott sighed. "Where could she be?"
Cedric looked at the wall where the door seemingly refused to materialize and thought of all the places she could have wandered off to besides those they had already checked. He looked at Scott. "Maybe she's in the hospital wing."
Scott gave him a sardonic look. "Why would she be there? She didn't seem sick this morning." He deadpanned, sarcasm evident in his tone.
"Maybe something happened in one of her classes," Cedric suggested. "Things go wrong all the time. Accidents happen."
Scott seemed to consider Cedric's idea for a moment before shrugging. "I don't see why we can't at least check."
With that, they turned and left the corridor.
Had they been paying closer attention, they would have noticed that the door finally materialized and the knob turned to quietly open it, a few shadows creeping out and noiselessly skulking down the hall in the opposite direction.
Hermione shot up and was immediately met with a dizzying headache. She placed her face in her hands for a moment to gather her bearings before lifting it and opening her eyes to find herself in a sterile white bed in the hospital wing. She was met by the unsmiling faces of Madame Pomfrey, Professor Dumbledore, and Professor McGonagall.
"How do you feel, Miss Granger?" Dumbledore asked her, concern laced into his question.
She blinked a few times to get her eyes to adjust to the bright whiteness in the room before replying, "Fine. A little lightheaded." Her back ached and her right hand was still throbbing from earlier for some reason.
"Do you think you could perform a few spells for a quick evaluation before you're discharged?" Madame Pomfrey asked, her expression riddled with unease.
McGonagall looked at her incredulously. "Poppy, I don't think Miss Granger is any condition to—"
"Minerva, please," Dumbledore interrupted, and Professor McGonagall turned to him.
"I apologize, Albus, but have either of you forgotten what I told you occurred in my class this afternoon?" McGonagall demanded sternly.
Hermione looked between the three adults in confusion. "I only fainted," she said. "I think I can cast a handful of spells."
They turned to her in surprise. "Are you sure?" Madame Pomfrey asked her.
Hermione's face was set in determination. "I'll be fine."
"Miss Granger, I'm asking you to please reconsider—" Professor McGonagall began, but Dumbledore held up a hand to her to silence her.
"She has decided for herself, Minerva." He told her solemnly, his voice soothing and quiet.
Hermione looked around for her wand but couldn't see it anywhere. "Where's my wand?"
Madame Pomfrey pulled it out of one of her robe pockets and handed it to her. "Here."
Hermione accepted it gratefully. "Thank you." She examined it to make sure she hadn't damaged it when she dropped it earlier because she had been in such a rush that she hadn't checked it, but it was in perfect condition. "What spells would you like me to do?"
Madame Pomfrey took a clipboard off the bedside table, flipping through a few pages before saying, "Nothing too complex, but you've done this before so I'm sure you remember what to expect."
Hermione nodded as the nurse explained which ones she needed to cast. "Okay," she assented, slowly drawing herself to her feet and standing. "I can do that."
McGonagall looked extremely vexed about it, but didn't speak up as Hermione prepared herself to cast the levitating charm she learned in first year. Easy.
She pointed her wand at the pillow on her bed and took a deep breath, guiding her hand through the motion as she said in a confident voice, "Wingardium Leviosa."
As soon as the words left her lips, a sudden jolt of pain ran up her arm and the pillow jerked half an inch to the left. It did not raise even a millimeter from the bed.
Hermione stared in disbelief at the failed spell she had just cast. That was a first year enchantment.
She heard McGonagall's gasp and felt frustrated tears pooling in her eyes. "I messed up," she whispered, turning to the three stony-faced adults. "I just messed up, that's all," she said desperately. "I'm going to try it again."
She blew her hair out of her face and pointed her wand at the pillow again.
Swish and flick, she thought. Swish and flick. Swish and flick.
She took another deep breath.
"Wingardium Leviosa," she repeated, her voice trembling slightly from her nervousness.
Again, another jolt of pain flashed up her right arm and she immediately let it fall to side, breathing heavily as spasms of pain overtook her fingers. She looked from her twitching hand to the pillow and felt her heart stutter.
It hadn't moved at all that time.
A few beats of silence passed while Hermione tried to accept that her spells hadn't worked. That had never happened to her before.
"What's the next one?" She asked softly, finally breaking the stillness in the air.
She didn't receive an answer.
"I said, what's the next spell?" She demanded, whipping her head around to the nurse.
Madame Pomfrey looked at her sadly. "The summoning charm," she told her.
Hermione saw the disbelief written all over Dumbledore's face and the grief in McGonagall's eyes and wanted to show them that she was fine.
She was fine.
"Fine," she snapped, angrily pushing her hair out of her face again. She was on the verge of tears but everything was going to be okay. She could do this.
She looked around the room for something to summon and decided on a glass sitting on a table across the room. She took another deep breath to calm herself down and focused all her attention on the cup.
"Accio cup!" She cried, waving her wand with perfect form, before letting out a sharp cry as pain flew up her spine directly from her wand hand. She clenched her wand as hard as she could as her tears began falling, panting shallowly for air. The cup trembled on the table before falling over and shattering into a million pieces.
A familiar voice came back to her, swimming in her ears from her subconscious.
You have a choice to make.
She dragged her sleeve across her face and shouted the spell again and again, pointing at different objects in the room, her form getting sloppier and sloppier each time, until she had collapsed to the ground writhing in pain.
The memory of the ball of light floating in nothingness came back to her while her eyes were blinded from the pain. She saw her hand reaching out for it but couldn't reach it no matter how hard she tried.
"Why isn't it working?" She cried out, thrashing about blindly, sobbing onto the stone floor. "Why does this hurt?"
Ah, the voice murmured, fading in and out, but all dark magic comes at a price.
"Hermione," Professor Dumbledore's voice broke through the haze of pain that swam in her consciousness, "you gave Mr. Diggory—"
The woman's voice drifted back into her head again, a single powerful whisper that obscured the rest of his sentence.
Let it go, Hermione…
It was drowned out by the shrill shriek of a train whistle blowing, filling Hermione's mind until she thought it would burst until she suddenly felt numb, her eyes drying out and the pain subsiding.
Her head was filled with what sounded like static from a radio searching for a signal, the sound fading out as if the train had disappeared into the distance. "What?"
She couldn't breathe or move.
"Oh, Albus…" McGonagall's tearful voice drifted into her ears and Hermione lay very still.
Madame Pomfrey spoke up next, her voice regretful. "Miss Granger, you're not—"
A chorus of terrified screams filled the hospital wing suddenly, and Hermione sat up sluggishly in response, feeling dazed and cold inside. She blinked her eyes a few times to clear the inky blackness around the edges and the world gradually came back into focus.
The three adults looked between each other in alarm at the continued shrieks that resonated in the room. Hermione turned her head toward the doors as they banged open and two familiar boys came rushing in toward her.
"Hermione—" Harry yelled, his glasses hanging crookedly on his face and his hair a mess—
"They're here!" Ron shouted breathlessly, interrupting the other boy, and they both rushed forward to crouch beside her on the floor.
Hermione looked between them, feeling disconnected from everything as she asked in a distant voice, "Who?"
"Death Eaters," Harry breathed, grabbing one of her arms to pull her up. "They're in the castle."
Ron nodded furiously, his blue eyes wild. "We lost track of Lav and Gin and the others, but we came to you as soon as we could. We've got to go, Hermione."
"They're looking for us," Harry told her urgently, his green eyes blazing with terror before hardening in anger. "He's here and he wants both of us."
Author's Note: Oh look, a cliffhanger. Whoops.
What do you think is going to happen? And do you think you've figured out what's wrong with Hermione yet? I guess you'll have to wait and see…
I love you guys. ;)
-Caitlyn
P.S.
For those of you who just got this notification in your email after adding it to your alerts list that flipped out and went, "OMG WHAT DO YOU MEAN, 'CHAPTER TWENTY'? THIS IS SUPPOSED TO BE CHAPTER TWENTY EIGHT SO WHAT AM I SUPPOSED TO DO WITH MY LIFE AND WHAT DID YOU DO TO THE OTHER CHAPTERS, CAITLYN?" Here is what's up: I finally got through with my editing which also explains why all the chapters now have generic numbered titles (I feel like it keeps you guessing as to what's going to happen this way). If you haven't read through it recently, you might want to at least give the earlier chapters a look again because I've changed quite a bit.
One of the biggest changes I added was that Hermione didn't realize she was in love with Cedric until the chapter before this one.
Yep, you heard that right.
She literally just realized she's in love.
To be honest, I feel like that's a more realistic approach to things because it adds more meaning to the realization instead of her one day going, "huh, well, guess this fluttery girly feeling means I'm in love so yeah, I'm in love. *drools*"
Okey dokey, well, that's really all from me now. Hope you have a fantastic day and enjoy those nice little bombs I dropped on you.